


Querencia

by redpandawriter



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Crying, Fluff, Gen, Imaginary Friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2017-12-31
Packaged: 2019-02-25 22:01:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13222107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redpandawriter/pseuds/redpandawriter
Summary: To think someone so small, and so important, could trust in him so wholeheartedly. A trust that could be betrayed so easily, if he wasn't careful. He likened it to watching a snake hug a kitten.(The struggles of Noctis being friends with someone he really shouldn't be friends with.)





	Querencia

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ADyingFlower](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ADyingFlower/gifts).



> Hey Ana, guess who your secret Santa is? ;)

10 year old Noctis Lucis Caelum shouldn't have imaginary friends, he was too old to have them, he should be more concerned about his studies and eating his vegetables. That's what all the adults would tell him when he tried to tell them about the little messenger and the strange man. It was annoying but he supposed not everyone could see what he could. He was just starting to accept that when Iris, a little out of the blue, asked about his friends. Noct hadn't been sure what to make of this but she did seem genuinely interested and he jumped at the chance to share his world with someone.

The first friend the prince told her about was called Carbuncle. A little white fennec fox with a red ruby for a horn on its forehead. It often visited Noct in his dreams and it occasionally taught him magic. She didn't seem to believe that last part, at least until he showed Iris what exactly the little creature was teaching, then she seemed just a little jealous.

If he were honest, it was a little funny to watch her run up to Clarus and ask him if she could learn magic like him, but he didn't appreciate the scolding it earned him later.

The second friend was an older man with reddish purple hair. He refused to tell Noct his name so he became known as Mr. Fedora because he liked wearing a fedora. He only ever appears when the prince was alone, and refused to tell the prince how he made it so that no one ever bothered them during their time together. Noct knew it had to be some kind of magic, probably something super advanced though. 

Mr. Fedora liked to talk using fancy words but had lots of fun stories to tell, plus he also knew how to fight with a sword, and Noctis had begged for the man to teach him. After some time of constant pestering and irritating, the red head relented, better that than magic he heard the man mutter. It was these forms that the prince decided to try teaching to Iris, hoping to cheer her up from being told she couldn't learn Carbuncle’s magic.

He had just finished showing her the basic forms when Ignis found them and called for the king. It was the second time that week Noctis had endured a lecture on his behavior, basing his training on what a figment of his imagination “taught” him and dragging someone else into, what had been deemed, a dangerous scenario. Nevermind that the prince had been practicing so often and had permission from Mr. Fedora to try his hand at teaching someone.

Suffice it to say that Noctis Lucis Caelum shouldn't have imaginary friends. Except they _weren't_ imaginary, they are _real_ it's just that no one believes him. Even Iris stopped asking about them, after the too many times of getting in trouble.

Noct tried really hard not to care, he really tried to be okay with being told to stop with ‘this childish nonsense’. He really did. Honestly. But when he next saw the red headed man, the bubble of stress that formed from being repeatedly denied, and had been filling up, finally popped.

It had surprised the older man, to appear with his usual devil may care smile only to find the young boy burst into tears at the sight of him. The child didn't show signs of stopping either, and he was starting to feel a bit awkward just standing there, staring. He should probably comfort the kid, so he thought.

Slowly inching forward, he cooed soft sympathies before kneeling and reaching out to him. Placing a hand on the prince's back, he began rubbing circles there. It took a few minutes of this before Noctis had calmed down enough to just hiccups.

“There there, child, better now?” Said child sniffed and nodded. “Tell me what upsets you.”

And Noctis did, of what all the adults told him, of what Iris did for him, of how sick of people not believing him he was. He poured his soul out to the man before him, hiccuping and sniffling all throughout.

When Noct had finished telling his tale, there was a brief silence, only broken by his occasional sniffle. The fedora wearing man stared at him with a look he couldn't discern, along with the silence it was making the child nervous.

“You are stubborn kit,” the older man finally said, “though perhaps, that is not entirely a bad thing.”

Noct blinked, “What?”

Mr. Fedora smiled, “There's no need to fret, my dear Noct. You should be quite proud of yourself, in fact.”

“Why?” he asked.

“Because despite what all you have been through, your mind remains unchanged. You know the truth, and refuse to let others deface it.” He reached out to tuck a piece of Noctis’s hair behind his ear, looking a little somber as he continued, “If nothing else, I, at the very least, am honoured to hear you defend my existence as such.”

“I forget you talk funny,” the prince replied after a beat, brows furrowed at trying to decipher all the big vocabulary the old fart liked to use.

The elder glared gently at that, more amused than angry with the child. “Perhaps you need more Lucian lessons, then, no?”

Noctis pursed his lips, not liking the sound of lessons at the moment.

Sensing the unrest, the redhead smirked and lightly pinched the boy's cheek, “Or perhaps a tale, to help lift those spirits of yours, how does that sound?”

Noct’s eyes brightened as he nodded, a smile forming on his lips as he recalled other stories the man liked to tell him.

“Then let us be seated somewhere much more pleasant, like the sofa, preferably.” He continued on as such, gathering the child in his arms and carrying him to the closest couch. The redhead held him close still, even as began to weave his story of the evening.

The man was very warm, his coat snug and secure, and the resonance of his voice was low and soothing. Noctis couldn't help but take note of the faint scent of honey and chamomile. _Real,_ he thought, his eyes beginning to feel heavy, _this man is real and no one can tell him otherwise._

As he brought the story came to close, Ardyn marveled at the sight before him. A prince of Lucis, the prophesied king of light and the one destined to end him, curled up in his coat, asleep and breathing evenly. It brought a wistful smile to his face.

To think someone so small, and so important, could trust in him so wholeheartedly. A trust that could be betrayed so easily, if he wasn't careful. He likened it to watching a snake hug a kitten. Still, some part of him deep inside his blackened heart, Ardyn was a little endeared to the prince. 

_If only such a peace could last, he thought,_ brushing stray hairs out of the child’s face. _But I'll take what I can get._


End file.
